LSP Developer Community? – an informal survey
I’d like to ask for input on an idea I’ve had for some time now. Would there be significant interest in a new community that included both ITC’s Local Support Partner (LSP) program, as well as the input and expertise from the beTech community? The community could be called the “LSP Developer Community.” It could perhaps piggyback on the existing infrastructure already in place with the current LSP program, but expand on it, with the help of beTech.
In other words, this would not take the place of beTech. BeTech could live on as-is. Instead, could the LSP program be expanded upon to include content that sort of sits in between beTech and the LSP developer content?
Here is what I’d greatly appreciate your feedback on:
- Are there UVa software developers out there who would like a community that addresses the needs of developers, but at a more “fundamental,” more “upper-management friendly” level than beTech?
- If so, does the concept of an “LSP Developer Community” sound like an idea worth entertaining?
- Optionally, if you’ve answered with an affirmative on #1 and #2, then what specific topics would you like to see addressed?
Here’s my supporting soapbox explanation:
ITC’s LSP program exists to foster communication and sharing between IT professionals at UVa. Historically, LSP Conferences and other training opportunities have been desktop-centric. Occasionally, there is some content at an LSP Conference related to programming; however, the target audience is usually people who are not able to devote the majority of their time to programming. The presentations are therefore pretty basic and often leave full time software developers undernourished
Since 2005, beTech has given these professionals a place to go. It’s provided an outlet for new knowledge and enthusiasm that’s usually far outside the scope of the current LSP program (and with a very different structure). But is there a substantial set of useful “software development” topics between the high-end presentations of beTech and the historical emphasis of the LSP program that could be addressed by a new IT community?
I attended the last LSP conference and there was a session entitled “developer’s roundtable.” I thought this session was to gauge interest in expanding the LSP Program to better address full time developers, so I brought a list of potential topics. We easily compiled this list here in Arts and Sciences and we did it very quickly. The list was long and, to the best of my knowledge, listed no topics that are regularly addressed by either beTech or the LSP program.
Personally, I would consider this subject matter more fundamental to software development than what beTech usually addresses. I’m afraid I have a bit of a bias here because I’ve never been a fulltime web master. Flash, CSS, Photoshop, Fireworks, for example, are lower priority in my job than SQL and C#.
My job is to help automate administrative functions in the University via hand-written software. My applications as well as others written and supported by my colleagues often replace paper forms with web-based systems. It seems that these systems always require a database, server-side web technology, and HTML. Data exchange between various systems also plays a huge role, too. Often there’s a need to pump data from one system to another.
These are the issues I wrestle with everyday. In fact, I am convinced that I could make a whole career at UVa developing applications that target these administrative domains.
In these applications, user experience and user interface design is of course important, although customers will usually settle for something uglier, as long as it works really well.
So, personally I tend to shy away beTech presentations centered around building glamorous looking web applications. I tend to prefer to hone the skills in the more basic, fundamental technologies, as well as the craft of software development as a whole. For example I’m a huge fan of the philosophies of “Agile” and books like “The Pragmatic Programmer.”
My boring, practical approach to my work almost makes me feel a little old. If I loosened up and decided to have more fun with things, I’d probably engage in beTech way more than I already do.
This is the part of me that identifies more with the culture of the LSP program. The LSP program feels a little more “official” and the community prides itself in providing reliable support for critical computing across the University. But I’ve yet to drink a beer at an LSP gathering!
These are two organizations with very different personalities and missions, but I have a hard time believing that I’m the only person who doesn’t identify with both communities at some level.
What if, for example at the next LSP Conference, there was a whole set of sessions for developers? Some topics could perhaps be fundamental software or database development topics, others could feature beTech presenters showcasing newer, perhaps more dazzling technologies? Could this community thrive if it had the support of the LSP Program as well as beTech?
